Thursday, October 27, 2011

2011 CBS Sports A.L.-Only Analyst League Recap

For the third year in a row, I won a title in one of the CBS Sports.com Analyst leagues. In 2009, I won in the A.L., in 2010 in the N.L., and this year I won again in the A.L.

How did I do it? It was almost entirely due to the strength of my auction.

2011 Patton and Company team, CBS Sports Analyst League

#

Player

$

Sal

+/-

AVG
BID

C

Adam Moore

$0

$1

-1

$1

C

Jason Varitek

$6

$1

5

$1

1B

Casey Kotchman

$15

$1

14

$1

2B

Dustin Ackley

$10

$2

8

$6

SS

Erick Aybar

$21

$4

17

$12

3B

Michael Young

$30

$14

16

$18

CO

Kevin Kouzmanoff

$2

$10

-8

$11

MI

Macier Izturis

$12

$1

11

$7

OF

Jacoby Ellsbury

$45

$29

17

$29

OF

Grady Sizemore

$5

$18

-13

$14

OF

Ichiro Suzuki

$24

$28

-4

$26

OF

Josh Willingham

$19

$11

8

$10

OF

Delmon Young

$13

$24

-11

$21

DH

Hideki Matsui

$12

$8

4

$9

P

Andrew Bailey

$11

$19

-8

$17

P

Nick Blackburn

-$1

$1

-2

$1

P

Clay Buchholz

$7

$15

-8

$16

P

Trevor Cahill

$9

$15

-6

$13

P

Octavio Dotel

$4

$7

-3

$3

P

Gio Gonzalez

$21

$12

9

$14

P

David Price

$24

$23

1

$21

P

Ervin Santana

$20

$11

9

$11

P

Dan Wheeler

$4

$1

3

$0

Total

$314

$260

+54

$260

You can see where I cleaned up: on offense. $216 of production for $156 spent is mighty sweet. There was certainly some luck involved. While I obviously believed in Ellsbury, no one in his right mind would have expected $45 worth of production. Kotchman was a case of me grabbing a warm body in the end game and catching earth, wind and fire in a bottle.

However, there were some solid buys as well. Aybar and Izturis are the kind of players I've cleaned up with in the CBS leagues in the past: boring players that other teams run out of money for because teams spent $40+ for Robinson Cano, Miguel Cabrera or Evan Longoria. And Young was inspired: a $14 buy in early February when everyone thought he was going to the National League except for me. Young was a moderate risk with a huge reward.

Then there was the pitching. While I avoided any bombs, I didn't hit on any aces either (Price was the only Top 10 pitcher I got). Price, Gonzalez, and Santana were a nice start to my staff, but Buchholz and Cahill left me scrambling for starts all year long. And I was right to be worried about my saves. Even before Bailey got hurt, my poor gamble on Dotel failed to pay off and I had spent $26 on less than a full season from Bailey and one measly save from Dotel.

Fortunately, my mistakes didn't matter much:

2011 CBS Sports A.L.-onlyAnalyst League "Draft" Standings

Team

R

HR

RBI

SB

BA

K

W

SV

ERA

WHIP

TOT

Patton & Company

10.5

6

12

10

12

12

9

3

9

4

87.5

Baseball HQ

7

8

10

8

9

10.5

6.5

6

10

6

86

Fantasy Pros 911

12

9

11

9

4

4

10

8

3

3

73

Yahoo! Sports

6

2

5

12

6

7

12

6

8

9

73

CBS Melchior

9

10.5

9

3

7

10.5

6.5

5

4

7

71.5

Mastersball.com

4

4

4

4

3

5

5

9

12

12

62

Stats LLC

10.5

12

8

11

2

2.5

1

10

2

2

61

Fantasy Sports Empires.com

2

7

3

5

1

6

11

4

10

8

57

CBS Eisenberg

3

1

2

2

10

9

4

12

7

6

56

MLB Network Radio

1

3

1

1

11

8

8

1

11

11

56

CBS White

8

10.5

7

6.5

5

1

3

7

1

1

50

Fantasy Baseball.com

5

5

6

6.5

8

2.5

2

2

5

5

47

While I might have cleaned up on value, I did not clean up in points. Coming out of the auction, it looked like Baseball HQ and me and then the rest of the pack.

Then I compounded things by doing next to nothing to help myself all year long. David Robertson and Sam Fuld were the only free agents I added who earned $10 or more. While I did get both Fuld and Robertson early, I also missed out on most of the stronger free agent acquisitions. I also made the only trade of the year in CBS...and it didn't work out. Shortly after Bailey came back, I flipped him for Justin Smoak. I figured I had only one point to lose in saves and could jump up in HR/RBI/runs with any halfway decent hitter. Right idea, wrong hitter. Smoak was in the middle of a slump when I acquired him and he never got back on track.

I lost four points in-season, finishing with 83.5 points. Fortunately for me, Baseball HQ's entrant lost even more: dropping 11 1/2 points to finish with 74.5

This is the view I have now from my rear-view mirror. In season, it wasn't that simple. HQ had a 10-point lead with five and a half weeks left in the season. Just like 2010, it looked like a win wasn't going to be in the cards for me.

Unlike 2010, my win this year had less to do with a surge by my team but by a collapse by a team in front of me. Do I feel cheap winning that way?

No. A win is a win, and I'll take one anyway I can get it. I had laid the foundation for a successful season, and wouldn't have been in position to capitalize on HQ's collapse without a strong auction. It was an ugly win, but I'm more than happy to put another trophy on my Rotisserie case.